Wednesday, April 23, 2008

There wasn't a ton of coverage of the fact Jeremy Roenick sat for Game 6, but it was a bit of an interesting sidebar heading in that he would be back in the lineup Tuesday. Ron Wilson had said his grizzled veteran looked tired and needed the rest, despite playing scant minutes, and even though he only picked up a little more than 11 tonight, they were big ones.

Two goals and four points for a guy most didn't see playing beyond a hideous last season in Phoenix.

On the Calgary side, you don't win a lot of Game 7s when you're doubled up on the shot clock, but Miikka Kiprusoff's mediocre season turned into a mediocre postseason. Ultimately, that's as much to blame for the loss as anything.

10 Comments:

This is almost the kind of season and playoff that ruins a goaltender, one way or another - either because he loses confidence, or management loses confidence in him. Do you see a chance of that happening with Kiprusoff? Mighty big contract extension they gave him last October...

TSN was interviewing Roenick about what it's like to play in Game 7, and he brought up losing to Tampa in the ECF, I dont think he was going to allow his team to have that feeling. Good to see that he's still got a bit left in him.

I don't think Kipper was bad and I'm not sure he should've been pulled, but he wasn't great either. He was fighting the puck and I found one thing interesting. In one of the previous games Nabakov was standing up looking for a loose puck in front of the net and Drew Remenda mentioned that all Warren Strelow goalies are taught to stand up to find the puck. All series but especially in game 7 Kipper was going down to find the puck and it burned him on the back-breaking Pavelski goal. I wonder if Calgary's coaching staff has tried making some changes that either haven't worked or weren't needed, or if Kipper has gotten sloppy with his fundamentals.

Keenan should go. It was his pettiness and poor judgment that put Cujo in goal, instead of going with his better player. Sutter has gone from Playfair to Keenan and either he makes a change to get a coach more familiar and knowledgeable about today's game and players, or go himself. Enough of the retro-coach. Management, and more precisely coaching, is responsible for this loss.

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About Me

James has covered the NHL and the game of hockey since 2004, beginning with this website and continuing with The Globe and Mail (2008-16) and The Athletic. He is a member of the Professional Hockey Writers' Association, a long-time radio analyst with TSN and was the NHL network manager at SB Nation from 2008 to 2010. A graduate of Thompson Rivers and Ryerson universities, James grew up in Kamloops, B.C. as a season ticket holder in the Blazers' glory years.

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